The present invention relates to a system for transferring multimedia information. Multimedia information is a generic term for several kinds of digital information coexisting in one information media, those digital information including digital moving pictures, digital still pictures, digital text data, and digital audio data. More particularly, the present invention relates to the multimedia information transfer system which is suitable to transferring data from a multimedia server for generating large amounts of multimedia information having streams with high bit rates to a server and a client coupled in a client server system (termed CSS) through a multimedia information network represented as a CATV network or an internet.
In general, the CSS used for business is arranged so that part of work to be processed by a server of the CSS is given to a multimedia server such as an outsourcing center and the processed result is given back to the CSS through a network.
The multimedia server, to which part or all of the functions about a project are entrusted, a setup including, and a promotion of an information processing system used for business in an enterprise is required to process a large amount of data streams with high bit rates in order to make good use of the multimedia information for backing up the processing of the CSS. Hence, the multimedia server is generally arranged by the leased hardware, a supercomputer (super parallel machine), a mainframe, a general-purpose server machine, a configuration of standard computers interconnected with one another (distributed architecture), or the like.
This kind of technology is described in "Technical Trend Toward Video Server Served as Core of VOD" of "Business Communication" November 1994, issued by Business Communication, Ltd., for example.
When transferring data between different kinds of information processing systems coupled through a communication network, an extended waiting time for access to the communication network is a significant problem. In particular, when transferring a large amount of data such as multimedia information, the waiting time for access and the transfer time are bottlenecks with regards to efficiency of the transfer system.
The technology described in the aforementioned publication has difficulty in overcoming the bottleneck in connection with the network and in quickly and efficiently transferring data between the multimedia server and a plurality of CSS servers and between the CSS server and a plurality of clients. These difficulties makes it impossible for a client for using the data transferred thereto to sufficiently meet the requirements of receiving a large amount of data streams with high bit rates in real time and performing reproducing processes of the multimedia information represented as image data, those reproducing processes including a fast feed, a stop, and a reverse like reproduction of a video disk, for example.